Blogger X's Comci-Con Update

Blogger X here from Comic Con in San Diego with some juicy tidbits that major left wing media outlets aren't reporting on.

Who is getting a new Comic from Top Cow. My Sources Say Glenn Beck. That's right everyone's favorite truth teller/possible rapist is getting a new book. Called "Invest in Gold presents Glenn Beck's Conspiracy." Sources describe it as "Taking place 5 minutes into the future Beck is on the run from an unkown conspiracy that somehow involves Barak Obama (rhymes with Alabama, they made sure to point out that this was not the current president). Also we are working on the first crying cover." We are all looking forward to that.

Which major comic has Blogger X got confirmed to be the next Adult Swim show. My sources tell me it's the Comic strip "Henry". Based off the success of "The Boondocks" Adult Swim is trying again with "Henry." My sources tell me "Henry is what speaks to the people of the last three or four generations. It has universal appeal and is extremely funny. And we shall stay true to the source material. No talking Henry in this one!" Wow, am I excited for that. Especially since I dress up like Henry for the last 3 Comic-Cons.

In casting news it is confirmed that Vinnie Jones will be playing the main character in the upcoming live Action "Maus" adaptation.

Well it's time for me to log off. Once Again, this is Blogger X not Alan.

For shame IDS, for shame

Now it's not as if I have come to expect much from the IU student newspaper. Most student publications suffer from the same type of problems. There are always the pretentious, arty column writers who try and be edgy and funny but fail on both accounts. There are the fluff pieces about the student government which no one outside of said student government care about. There's the need for the design majors to show off their new and creative idea about how to lay out a page. And with the need to put out a product every day there will always be the hastily put together stories about some wacky on campus happening or bio of a local person.

Earlier this week though there were two major stories that I was a bit shocked ran as prominently as they did. One was so unoriginal and uninspired I wondered how it even made it to print, let alone taking up the entire first page of the second section of the paper. And the other celebrated events that I think the university should frown upon. And if they won't frown upon it, they might as well not acknowledge it as a kind of silent protest.

The first point was a full front page dedicated to their depiction of "The Radish." To call this a blatant copy of "The Onion" would be absolutely correctly. The little radish icon they used is almost exactly the same, save the colors of the vegetable. The fake news stories and headlines were all laid out exactly as they are on The Onion. I'm not even sure what the point of the entire page was. If it was intended to be funny, like the Onion is, they failed. All the jokes were really poorly written. And because of it's to the letter copying of the source material one would expect that it would then be as funny.

I was just really shocked that the editors and writers felt that this would be a good idea. By ripping off a site that is known to basically their entire readership, they set themselves up to fail right off the bat. The reason the Onion is so funny is because they have an entire staff full of comedy writers who do this type of thing all the time. They write all kinds of shit, and they throw out the bad stuff. There was none of this kind of editing going on.

On top of that there was no originality being shown. Why copy the success of someone else? And again, if your going to attempt to copy a successful enterprise of someone else, you better damn sure do a really good job of it so that people can't see the flaws so clearly.

The second major problem I had with this specific issue was their glorification of the party culture surrounding Little 5. They specifically profiled an outgoing senior who threw a massive party. They outlined his planning of the all day affair, from his setting up entire sound systems outside his house for bands, reinforcing his deck so it didn't cave in to the large amounts of weight it would be holding, and to buying massive amounts of chocolate pudding for a ladies only wrestling contest.

The article goes on to talk about the party getting busted up by the cops on multiple occasions, people getting fined, and also the organizer ending up in the wrestling match with two ladies. During the description of his "wrestling" with the two girls the article goes on to talk about he he attempted to remove the girls tops for the joy of the crowd. He eventually succeeded on one girl, who ran away while covering up. She obviously didn't want to be topless, regardless of her participation in the event.

I find multiple problems with this article. First of all it was one of the longest articles I have ever seen in the IDS, which in itself is pretty shameful. The second is the celebration of Little 5 as an event where out of control drinking is acceptable, borderline sexual assault is encouraged, and much planning and care must be put into throwing out of control parties just for the sake of itself.

On top of all that, the article is being published by the university through their student newspaper. IU as a school should not be promoting Little 5 in this fashion. While it is fact that the entire week is now looked at as week long party with the races as only a secondary event, this is not the universities doing and should not be encouraged. Collage used to be something people really had to try hard to get into. Secondary education was not a given for most people. Now that many schools have turned into money making machines first, education centers second, this kind of behavior seems to be becoming more and more acceptable.

If the IDS had chosen to write an article about this same individual, and used him as an example of all the wrong ways that the Little 5 week has become I would see no problem with that being run. But in celebrating this kid's week and wild parties, and in turn celebrating the wild, rampant partying that is accepted during Little 5, the IDS has validated this type of behavior.

A combination of unoriginality and misplaced praise marked a very disappointing day to be affiliated with IU. I don't think it's wrong to expect more out of university.

Avatar

I was going to do a longer review of Avatar, explaining my thoughts and feelings regarding it, but then I stumbled upon this online youtube review and it sums up my feelings even better than I ever could. Be fore warned, this review is in 2 parts, and totals about 20 minutes. It is NSFW, but is really funny, really well put together, and hits all the points I was going to make. Thanks guy for allowing me not to have to write to much.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJarz7BYnHA&feature=channel

To sum up, Avatar was an OK movie. Yes, the new 3D and motion capture technology is great, and their CGI was pretty awesome. But so what. If you have to spend that much money to make your movie look that good, is it worth it? Do you have to rely on computers to create visually interesting set pieces? No. James Cameron set out to prove that he could revolutionize movies, and he supposedly did it. But in the long run, it's just going to make movies more expensive to make, which means studios will charge the theaters more to show them, which will in turn raise ticket prices to go to the movies even higher than their already astronomical rates. And when/if they don't recoup all their expenses during a theatrical run, the movie studios will in turn jack up DVD prices so they can try and squeeze every last dime out of the public. Is this what we want. To spend even MORE money on the movies just so we can see some blue people run around in space fern gully?

I love big, spectacular special effects and summer block busters. And I would have probably enjoyed Avatar even more if I could shrug off the bigger ramifications of a movie like this. But I couldn't. I also couldn't ignore that all the characters were so very basic that I didn't care what happened. Every plot point was so telegraphed that it carried no weight when it happened. And for a movie that was hoping, and ultimately succeeding in garnering Oscar buzz, this is a bad way to go about it. I read recently that Cameron and the producers were disappointed that none of their actors recieved Oscar nominations. Instead they will have to feast up on all the technical awards, as well as long shots for Director and Best Picture. Boo Hoo!

Anyone with any rational thought in their minds regarding movies and the award process would not even consider nominating any of these actors for an award for Best anything. This is not to mean to say that the film was poorly acted. The people did a fine job with what they were given. But what they were given just wasn't award worthy characters.

To finally sum up in what has turned out to be a much longer piece than I originally intended. Yes, Avatar looked cool. Too cool at times, as I got disoriented and annoyed with all the 3D shit they would pile up all at once. Yes, it was technologically ground breaking. No, it wasn't necessarily, and I don't want to see the larger ramifications of this kind of film becoming the standard.

Return of the Mack

It sickens me to look back on the blog here and see that my last post was in October. Not that the 2 people that read this on occasion have probably noticed, but I have been seriously lacking in the blog department. I'm gonna try and and pick up the pace.

I didn't complete my goal for the year of seeing 132 movies. I didn't even come close. In fact I saw fewer movies in 2009 than in any other year that I've kept track. Now to be fair, that's only been 3 years, but still. In a year that I was attempting to bypass my previous best, I came up well short. The final total for the year was 87. That's 45 short of my goal, and a little bit heartbreaking for me. This year I am not going with any set number of movies or hours. Simply, I'm going to watch movies and TV shows that I am interested in and that *hopefully* bring me enjoyment. I will keep track, and if the mood strikes me and I have something exciting to say perchance blog about it. Maybe this mindset will produce better results.

Much in the vain of the 2008 movie wrap up post, I'm going to do the same for my 2009 results. While 87 movies was well short of my personal goal, that does average out to more than 1 a week, which is far better than most I imagine. What will follow will be my top 5 and bottom 5 of the year. This will be limited to movies that I viewed for the first time ever in 2009, but does not mean they were made in 2009.

STATS:

87 movies watched
14 in the theater
2 repeat viewings in theaters (The Hangover, and Inglorious Basterds)
13 repeat viewings all together
74 new movies (to me)

Top 5 (in no particular order)

1. The Wrestler - Best movie I saw all year. Hands down. I still weep openly when I watch the ending. Of course I only watch that movie by myself, so no one can see my tears.
2. Drag Me To Hell
3. The Hangover
4. Watchmen
5. Inglorious Basterds

Almost made the cut: Zombieland, Up, Darkon, Trick R' Treat

Bottom 5 (in no particular order)

1. Miss March
2. Club Dread
3. Rachel Getting Married
4. The Brothers Solomon
5. Revolver

All of these I should have liked on paper, but simply couldn't connect with. Either they weren't funny enough, tried to hard, or just were just plain bad.

2010 has started off a bit slow. I've seen 4 movies, 2 in the theater and 2 at home. Though those stats are a little inflated as I saw 2 yesterday.

That's all for tonight. I'm gonna have a few more posts this week, but am pacing myself a tiny bit. One post for sure will be my thoughts/review of Avatar. I know James Cameron has been waiting to hear what I have to think of his latest work.

Movies are fun. Enjoy them.

ADD

When I was attending Ivy Tech full time my last 2 semesters, there weren't many other students that were carting their laptops with them to class and using them. Maybe it was the over abundance of computer labs at Ivy Tech, and the ease of access to all classes, as they are encapsulated in one building. Maybe it was just easier to take hand written notes or no notes at all. Most people, my self included, spent as little time at the actual building as possible. And presumably like me, everyone just went home and did their work on their computers from the comforts of their own home.

That is not true at IU. In my first full semester at IU, it's seemingly commonplace for everyone to have a laptop, and for everyone to use them during class. I'd say about 40 percent of the people in my classes use laptops during lectures. The only class that I don't see anyone using one is my English class, and I think that's just because it's more of a casual atmosphere where we just sit around and talk about the readings. No real lecture time.

Now I bring all this up to set up 2 separate stories that confound my brain.

In my Soc class, there is a guy who sits close enough to me to see his laptop during class. This class is a standard lecture class with about 80 students, and there are lots of notes to be taken. Most people just use the old tried and true method of pen and paper, while some are using their computers to type out a word document. Not this guy though. He has a specialized note taking program. This program formats the page to look just like a standard college rule notebook. It has the margin lines and lines across to write on just like a spiral notebook. And the font. OH the font. It looks just like someone's writing it down with a pen. Not some snazzy blocked up symmetrical font, but slightly askew print. So, presuming his Macbook Pro only cost him about 1300, he gets to type out all his notes to make them look like he wrote them down on paper. If he had just written them down on paper, he could have done so for about $4.26. But he doesn't have to do the "I gotta shake my hand cause it hurts so much from writing so much so quickly" move that is so common with the rest of us.

This second scenario is even more baffling to me. In one of my other classes, this same guy always sits in front of me. As soon as his butt hits the chair he has his laptop whipped out and fired up. He always instantly fires up facebook and starts checking his chat bar for who he can chat with during class. He then also starts looking at pictures and random creeping. Once that has lost it's intrest, he starts looking at his own set of pictures, usually the same set featuring him and some random girl posing all kissy face and whatnot out at some bar. At first I thought he was just some sad dude that just got dumped and was reliving his days gone by with his ex. I don't know anymore though. This has gone on for 5 weeks now.

But that isn't the end of this guys laptop ADD. He also types out whatever goes on the power point. He's not listening, just typing out whatever goes up on the board. In between typing these notes and creeping on FB, yesterday he was also watching some NHL highlights from the 1990's. With no sound on. The highlights were spaced in between interviews that he could not hear. Unless he's a lip reader, he picked the wrong set of hockey highlights to be watching. Now when it was time to "take notes" on a new slide, he would begrudgingly pause his hockey highlights, switch over to his notes by popping out his widgets that show all open windows, select his notes, and then switch back. He was visibly annoyed by this as he clearly only wanted to be watching his silent hockey movie. Eventually he got the bright idea that he could just shrink his notes down to about half the size of his screen, and then move the youtube video box to the other side, so he could have uninterrupted viewing and note taking at the same time. Such ingenuity and brain power displayed gives me hope for this young man's future. If only he can find a career where he can somehow manage upwards of 10 windows on his laptop screen, frantically switching back and forth between them trying against all hope to hold his ADD at bay and keep his mind occupied at all times on anything BUT his schoolwork, he'll be set for life.

I'm not saying I'm the most attentive student in the world. I get sleepy and yawn sometimes. I fidget, though mostly due to the fact that almost every classroom at IU is retrofitted with some of the most godawful and uncomfortable seating. But I try to pay attention. I take notes when I feel they will help me. Partially out of respect for my teachers. Either they will recognize that I'm trying to engage in the class and not just show up to get attendance credit and this will hopefully work in my favor down the line, or I am just trying to get my money's worth out of the experience. Why pay, or have someone else pay, for all these classes if your just gonna creep on FB and chat with your friends online. You can do that for free, from just about anywhere in the world. You don't have to pay 800 bucks a class or whatever it breaks down to at IU to slump down in a chair, act completely disinterested in what's going on around you, and relive that night at Upstairs where you totally felt up that hot blonde with big tits and then threw up over the balcony.

ZOMG!!!!

I'm back. I'm sure no one cares. Here are things you should see/not see based on what I've watched since my last update.

SEE
In Bruge
Star Trek
The Hangover
Drag Me to Hell
Inglorious Basterds
Observe and Report

MISS
Harry Potter 6
Revolver
City of Ember
Autopsy

There's a very small chance that I'm going to make my goal. It's in the single digits for sure. I'd need 72 more in the next 4.5 months, which would more than double my output for the first 8.5. It's not impossible, but improbable.

On to something new and different.

About a month ago my friend Rob came over to check out the new house while he was in town from Cali. We spent a good hour or so catching up on the deck, laughing and joking much like we have done for much of our relationship. Rob then busted out with a request that I simply just couldn't refuse. He and his fiance Ash are set to be wed next May, and asked me to preside over their nuptials. We had talked briefly about this about a year ago when Rob first announced his engagement to me and their very preliminary plans. Neither of them wanted a big church wedding, but something more along their tastes. I had suggested just having one of their friends get ordained online and take care of it that way. Fast forward one year later and it was coming true.

Yesterday I was looking through a blog that I frequent and happened across a link to http://www.dudeism.com/index.html For those uninitiated, this is a "religion" based on the teachings and practices of "The Dude" from the Big Lebowski. After Rob checked with the county clerks office, I quickly was ordained today and am one step closer to fulfilling my duties for my two friends. Mark it, Dude!

X-Men Origins: Wolverine

It's been a while since I last watched a movie and felt that I had to blog about it right away. And typically if I dive right into writing about something that quickly it is either a sign that I absolutely loved it or it was absolute dog shit. Well, I sure didn't love it.

Now when I watch a movie I like to read up on it. Typically I check my movie websites at least once a day that have pre-production notes about movies that I want to see, or pictures. Eventually once the movie comes out there are the reviews from critics that I respect, as well as the general populous reaction on a film. Granted I don't always enjoy the same thing the masses do, but it's a good starting off point. Now about a month ago, right before April Fool's Day, word spread around the internet of a leaked DVD quality print of the movie circulating the tubes well in advance of the movie actually coming out. I've heard that if you wanted to download a movie on the internet you typically have to wait until the DVD is a few weeks away from being released before a good quality print is leaked on the internet. So it seemed like a big deal to those that wanted to see the film early that such a good print was out already. Some believed that it was some kind of promotional April Fools Joke and that it wouldn't turn out to be real. Those ideas were false as many of the critics I follow began writing about how the work print that was released was real and that they didn't want anyone writing to them about the movie or sending them copies. Internet piracy is serious business and they wanted nothing to do with it.

I give you this long preamble, dear readers, as a bit of precursor to the excitement that people had over this movie. There were numerous reports of Fox, the studio releasing the film, giving reports that the print released was far from the finished product with scenes still missing. There was the subsequent threat of finding who leaked it and prosecuting. Reports of the FBI coming into help the investigation. Rewrites, Reshoots, and massively changed plot lines were all talked about in efforts to dissuade people from illegally downloading and watching the movie before it came out. Many speculated that the movie would suffer greatly at the box office because of this leak. Well, it still opened to an 85 million weekend, so I don't think they are hurting that much.

I am not one of those people that get so worked up over comic book movies that I feel cheated and wronged if even the slightest continuity from the books is changed for a movie. I just like movies. If they can stay close to the source material than that's awesome. But if some stuff gets reworked a bit to tell a better story than I'm fine with it. But one thing that I don't like is watching movies that have such gaping holes and problems in them that they are rendered unenjoyable. Granted I have seen and enjoyed many nonsensical movies in my time. But the difference is that when I watch a bad horror movie or cheesy sci-fi film I know going in that it's going to suck. Then I can enjoy it that much more. But Wolverine I was watching under the pretense that it would be good. Enjoyable. Fun. Kick Ass. Much like the first two X-men movies. I knew the directors and writers were different, but c'mon. You got the basic wolverine stuff down, so you just play with it and make it awesome right? OH NO.

First of all, they tried to cram in every cameo and special appearance of all the "cool" mutants that didn't make the cut (pun intended) in the previous Xmen movies. And by trying to introduce like 8 new characters in a movie that in it's title tells you that only one dude is getting the most screen time, and it ain't any of newbies, than you know your in for a disaster. Most of them only get about two scenes a piece. Some die off screen and only get mentioned again. Others just kind of hang out in the background. Which would work fine if you didn't cast all these stars and give them speaking roles. If you want to just put in a random shot of someone in the background for the fanboys, then do it. But don't play up the previews like you get all this action out of these other characters, and then only use them about 4 minutes each in the whole fucking movie.

But all that is just griping at some incidental scenes in the movie. Overall it's just limp and boring. There are random jumps in time and location. There is very little explaining why anything is going on. There seems to be an attempt to make Wolverine a caring loving man who get's wronged when his lady friend is killed, but who gives a shit. They do such a bad job at telling that story that I felt nothing about these characters. So when the lady meets her end, it was more of a feeling of satisfaction. Satisfaction in hoping that something cool would happen instead of another 20 minutes of them playing kissy face in Canada in between scenes of Hugh Jackman cutting down trees.

It's like the makers of the film forgot how to make a summer action movie. All the fights are lame and boring. All the mutants either die quickly or have regeneration powers so fighting just seems lame since you know they will heal up and continue to live no matter what. And since it's a prequal to the other X-Men movies, you know Wolverine, Sabertooth, and Striker all live. There is no drama to any of their scenes.

But my biggest gripe with this movie, and any movie for that matter, is the giant fucking plot holes that they open up. I'm all about suspending logic when watching movies. If I'm watching a movie and they set up some kind of rule about what's going on in that universe and they stick to it, I can follow with them reguardless of how ludicris those rules are. But the thing I can't stand is when you establish a rule, and then realize towards the end that you've painted your way into a corner you can't get out of. So instead of going back and fixing it, you just make some shit up. Which leads me to the ending, which put the shit topping on an already dung filled sundae.

SPOILER ALERT

So if you know anything about Wolverine at all, you know his bones are covered in Adamantium. Which is supposedly the hardest metal in history and can't be broken. They go over this in the movie as well in case your a newb who don't know shit. They then inject Wolverines body with the adamantium which then coats his bones so that he's indestructible. Couple this with his super healing powers and he's pretty formidable. So when he goes ape shit against the baddies who made him they decide they have to kill him. Everything is cool up to this point.

One of the very first scenes following him getting his shiny new metal bones is him playing with his new claws that can cut through anything. And he kinda rubs his claws together and they clang apart and make sparks, indicating that they can't cut themselves. They do this a couple of different times, just to make sure your getting the idea that his bones can't be broken.

OK, everyone following along at this point? They set up their logic point. They demonstrated it. It follows the normal progression of believability so far.

Then the wheels fall the fuck off. The baddies decide the only way to kill Wolverine is to shoot him with bullets made of Adamantium. They mention this about half way through the movie, being sure to include shots of the gun and bullets so that when it comes back later we can all go "OH YEAH, I REMEMBER"

So when the ending comes up they cut to a differnt shot of the baddie getting the gun out and saying that the bullets won't kill him, but it will erase his memories. Because his brain will heal itself after it get's shot, but the memories stored on that old tissue will be gone as it's filled in with new tissue. It's a pretty shitty conclusion, but I guess you could work with it.

OH YEAH, except for the fact they made sure to show you Wolverine getting all his bones covered in adamantium. Including his skull. Which holds his brain. So when he would get shot, if you went with all the rules they set up earlier, the bullet would hit his skull first and then bounce away. It would not in fact go into his brain and make him an amnesiac. But never mind that. We only have 10 minutes left in the movie. Shoot him in the head. Shoot him 3 times. It'll work. What's this now, oh he's a dumbfuck who can't even remember his name since he got shot. Awesome. Print it. It's a wrap.

I'm sure this movie will make money. It appeals to children who will beg, borrow, steal, mame, and do everything else under the sun to convince whoever they can to give them money to go see this movie. Hell, the opening weekend shows that to be true. I'm sure once all the numbers get crunched that this movie will make a profit. And if it makes even one red cent, than the movie studios will continue to make shitty products.